Interstellar Songbook!

Last summer, I was contacted by a friend of a friend in need of a dress to wear on the cover of her soon to be released CD.

We had such a great time working on this "costume".  Joanne Weaver is an amazing singer, I won't try to explain what her music is like because I'm not fluent in music at all. But, her fashion style is totally inspired by the sultry styles from the 40's. And that era makes my heart flutter a little faster too! So we had a great combination of using that inspiration and still wanting to make her look a little like a star filled midnight sky...... (with great legs!)

The Intersteller Songbook is now here! If your in NY, check her out this weekend in person! If your not in NY, check her out via social media from her links below..

and yep! that's the dress on the cover! :)

Joanne Weaver Interstellar Songbook CD Release Party Saturday, June 2nd Doors at 7pm Show starts promptly at 8pm Theatre80 80 St Mark's Place New York, NY $20 + $5 service fee Each guest will receive a complimentary CD and free entrance to after party. We kindly ask that you buy your tickets in advance. Buy Tickets Here
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Creative Collaborations

I love collaborations. I think I've mentioned this before. It's part of the reason why I love designing custom dresses, clothes and tiny hats. I love that interaction between an event, the person going to the event and me.

You can imagine that I also love bigger creative collaborations, photo shoots involving other artists and designers, collaborations with other designers, other communities... like, my Kickstarter community. While my "You Will Have Your Cake and Eat it too" Backers have been endlessly patient waiting for me to finally release the finished designs, I have been really struck by how much a community makes a difference.

collaboration between Hair Artist Cynthia Torres and Photographer Joe Tanis

So, my new collaborative effort is the photo shoot for "You Will Have Your Cake and Eat it too." Using other local creative professionals, we'll all bring our best talents together and see what we come up with. One of the coolest parts about getting to work with other creatives, is getting to see how every one's input helps to tell the story and move it forward.

One of my sisters got so excited when I started telling her about this photo shoot collaboration, she works in Arts and Education Development (my siblings are all brilliant.) And she said, that collaborative teams like this is what the world is moving towards and it's how they are finding that people work successfully together. Really, they are cutting edge. So fancy that! Here's to cutting edge collaborations!

Real Wedding on Snippet and Ink!

I just discovered one of my favorite Brides from last year was listed on a wedding blog and it really show cases how lovely the bride and groom really are!

They danced a Tango! so beautiful!

See the whole post and they're story (which is so lovely and romantic) here. They're actually coming up on their first anniversary, what a nice way to revisit such a beautiful wedding and joyous celebration . .  Happy Anniversary Karolina and Wayne!

Fascinating You . . .

We thought it was very light and airy but still had a nice drama.

 This is long overdue.

In April, Urban Girl Squad and I put together a Raffle to for winning a custom made fascinator. And happily, we had a winner!

Our winner, Kristen, brought herself and  her friend Adi all the way from the Upper East Side to my Brooklyn Studio (such a commitment!) on a lovely Saturday afternoon and had a little champagne, while we worked out this design.

Here's the winner with her friend Adi.

These are my new favorite kinds of feathers.

It was really fun, everything I love about doing collaborative custom work. She sent me some photos of fascinators and tiny hats that she liked and could also see herself wearing. Which is key, there are so many great hats out there, but there are some that even though I think they are amazing, I can't really imagine wearing it. She was the same.. despite our shared love of giant plumes.

And here she is in her fascinator!

And then we just hung out and looked at lots little pieces of feathers and fabric.


 So this is what we came up with, what do you think? I hope Kristen was able to wear it out for Kentucky Derby Day!

Another Rant, Why your dress does cost that much.

In my FB news feed today I saw a link to an NPR story called, Why Did My Wedding Dress Cost So Much?, as a wedding dress designer, I clicked on it and watched the 5 min video of the story.

In full disclosure I am a bit of an NPR addict. I wake up to WNYC and listen pretty much everyday, I'm a sustaining member of WNYC. And I loove Planet Money. Well, I was shocked and disappointed by now disappointing her story was and shocked and disappointed by the lack of actual reporting that she did.

She took her wedding dress to B & J (one of my favorite fabric stores) to research the cost of the materials and then she took it to a tailor to investigate the estimated cost of the dress construction in China. What she learned was the wholesale of the fabric likely cost about $500 and the making of the garment (what we call Cut, Make and Trim or CMT for short) was likely about $200.

From my experience her experts were right, I would totally agree. But that's when she decided that the dress should have cost about $1500 instead of the $2800 it did cost. And she felt ripped off.

I object.

There is so much that goes into a garment then just the materials and the CMT.

There is a person sitting at a desk somewhere that has an idea and sketches it out and edits it with a design team. There is a team of people that work to get the garment produced, and a different team that makes sure the dress fits. All this likely happens in an office, that pays rent. And all this happens before that dress even makes it to the Shop where she tried it on. Keep in mind that this dress was likely designed not in China and then manufactured in China and shipped on a boat to the states. None of that is free.

In that shop where she tried it on, there are people that work there, someone that owes the store and rents the space and picks what they will carry for the season. There was the salesperson that showed her the dress and helped her pick it out.

All these people are working. All these people are contributing to the design, production, sale of the dress and her experience. And instead of including that into the cost of her dress, she equated the cost of her dress as people selling her a beautiful memory.

While it may be true that many people make money in the wedding industry, and it may be true that some people over price things because they think they can, "say the W word and the price triples". In this case, it actually sounds like she got a bargain. Not ripped off.

There are no shortage of options for wedding attire, but someone designed a dress she wanted. And then a bazillion people brought that idea to fruition. (I didn't even mention the designer that designed the lace fabric that the dress designers picked out for that dress.) Maybe instead of making an article about how the industry trespassed on her emotions and sold her memories, she could write an article about how many people she actually helped to support in a struggling to recover world economy. Because that is what she actually did.

Rant over. Thank you.

Figure Flaws: a Rant.

Having recently gotten engaged, I have a whole new perspective on my job. It’s part of my job to read and look at bridal magazines. But now that I’m looking at them as a bride, I started seeing things I’ve previously dismissed: all the articles about hiding my figure flaws and finding the right dress to hid my figure flaws. Yuck. Figure flaws. That does not sound fun.

I don’t like the term ‘figure flaws’. In fact, it offends me.

Now, I understand that not all women are 100% in love with their figures all the time. But figure flaws? That's just rude. It assumes that it’s a given, it assumes the viewer doesn’t accept her figure. It assumes there is something about the bride that is flawed and must be hidden. There are so many beautiful women in the world, for what reason are we focusing on flaws? And why do we even call them that?! What’s with the implication that having curves or not having curves or being tall or short is a flaw? The only thing inclusive in that kind of thinking is that we are all flawed. This is just an observation but even women that don’t look like Gisele are beautiful.

Your figure isn’t flawed.

There might be things you love about your figure more then other things. Okay. So instead of calling the things you like less ‘flaws’, can we all agree to discuss instead the things you want to show off, the things you love? I’m completely in support of finding the dress that works for your body, we all look and feel better in some things then other things. Let’s talk about what you feel awesome wearing. Do you feel like Joan Holloway when you wear a pencil skirt? Fantastic! Do you feel feminine and sexy in a ball gown? Fantastic! Let’s start there.

I’ve had well-meaning friends suggest that I wear a padded bra to my wedding, thinking I guess that a padded bra would create some kind of cleavage. Um, I don’t have cleavage, with or without a padded bra. I know this kind of discussion comes up among friends even if there isn’t a wedding coming up. I would just like to suggest a different perspective in this conversation. My fiancé knew what I looked like when he proposed. He accepted me ‘warts and all’, as the saying goes. I would like to suggest that yours did too. And wouldn’t this whole process be more fun if the conversation was about what makes you feel the most beautiful? And happy?

Women of all shapes and sizes and backgrounds fall in love and get married everyday. Love doesn’t discriminate against different bodies types. Wedding dresses shouldn’t either. Love is inclusive.  Dresses can be too.

I saw a quote in the April issue of Vogue from Alber Elbaz, the fabulous designer of Lanvin in Paris that said, “When I think of women, I don’t think of size or age, I think of beauty.”

I say yes, of course, exactly! And thank you.

Happy Valentines Day!

Well hello strangers. I've been neglectful of this blog. So where to start to sum up?

Basically, I fell in love. Am in love....

December was a wild kind of month, I was working on a bunch of custom projects and I launched and completed my You Will Have Your Cake and Eat it too Campaign on Kickstarter. As soon as that finished, I went with my most amazing boyfriend to meet his family for the holidays. We came back to Brooklyn and as I was mulling over my New Years ideas and new designs, my most amazing boyfriend put a ring on my finger.

 (Photo by Joe Tanis)

We met at my sister's kitchen table. But we became friends working on photo shoots together. See above.

(me plus Joe!)

I'm now finding myself in the most interesting place as a wedding dress designer. I've been designing and sketching lots of dresses for the You Will Have Your Cake and Eat it too collection. But now, I'm also thinking about what a bride might want from a brand new place.

Will I design and make my own dress? Yes. Will it be white/ivory/cream? No. One of my top commitments in designing dresses for weddings, has always been that people end up feeling and looking like themselves, their very best selves. I don't feel so much like myself in white/ivory/cream. It has also been lovingly pointed out to me that because I am so pale, I look terrible in it. So there's that.

Am I telling what color it will be or will look like? No. You all will have to wait same as the groom to see it. :)

My theme this year is You Will Have Your Cake and Eat it too! (Its also the year of the Dragon. (I'm a dragon!)) I'll keep you all posted on the collection! and on all the Cake!

Wishing you lots of love for Valentine's day! xoxophae